10:56 am, October 26, 2022
Two Just Stop Oil activists were arrested this morning after paint was sprayed on the fronts of luxury car showrooms in central London.
Protesters began spraying paint at the dealerships on the corner of Berkeley Square and Bruton Street at 8.30am, with police arriving and detaining two people 16 minutes later.
The protesters targeted H.R. Owen, Jack Barclay, Bentley Motor Cars London and Ferrari Mayfair, spraying the paint from fire extinguishers.
The two who were arrested were taken into custody to a central London police station on suspicion of causing criminal damage.
A tweet by the campaigners shows the paint attack being carried out:
The protest was the latest in the campaign group’s month-long series of protests as it demands the government halt all new fossil fuel licences.
On Sunday, they blocked traffic on Abbey Road in London by recreating the famous zebra crossing pose from the cover of The Beatles’ eponymous album. They then unfurled a poster with the slogan ‘Just Stop Oil’ before sitting in the middle of the road.
Seven days earlier, they sprayed paint over Aston Martin’s flagship dealership on Park Lane.
The campaigners say police have made 585 arrests since they began their action at the beginning of October.
Seven Just Stop Oil demonstrators were also arrested yesterday after spraying paint on to the facade of 55 Tufton Street in Westminster – the headquarters of climate sceptic thinktank Global Warming Policy Foundation.
Protester Carmen Lean, 28, an architecture student from Glasgow, said: ‘New oil and gas is a death sentence for people all around the world.
‘You can throw us in prison but it won’t stop our outrage at this government throwing millions of people under the bus.
‘This government is using the crisis to push through more austerity on one hand and new oil licences on the other. Both are death sentences.’
Emma Brown, 31, also from Glasgow, said: ‘We have come down from Scotland to demand this toxic government in Westminster do another U-turn, this time on our broken energy system.
‘Get your hands off our North Sea oil and rapidly upscale the renewable energies that will prevent catastrophic climate breakdown and reduce our bills.
‘This is the immediate action we need to help the cost of living and the climate crisis.’
